What are Dry Eyes?

What causes Dry Eye?

Several contributing causes include:

· Ageing: tear production naturally decreases with age, particularly after 40.

· Screen use: reduced blink rate when looking at digital devices leads to faster tear evaporation.

· Environmental factors: air conditioning, heating, wind, and low humidity all dry out the tear film.

· Constant contact lens wear: some lenses can reduce oxygen to the eye surface and disrupt the tear film.

·Hormonal changes: particularly during menopause.

· Medications: antihistamines, antidepressants, and blood pressure medications can reduce tear production.

· Autoimmune conditions: such as Sjogren’s syndrome, rheumatoid arthritis, and lupus.

·Eyelid conditions: poor eyelid closure or blepharitis (eyelid inflammation) disrupts the tear film.

What are treatments for Dry Eye?

Treatments vary depending on the cause and severity of your symptoms. Your optometrist will give you treatment options that are best suited to you.

Treatment options include a huge array of lubricating eye drops, gels, and ointments. However, these may provide short-term relief, they often don’t help with the discomfort of chronic, or long-term dry eye disease.

And while some types of Dry Eye improve with lubricant drops, long-term use can be hard, inconvenient, and costly.

Luckily there are now new, exciting treatment options are specifically for dry eye disease. Intense Pulsed Light (IPL) is a precise light-based technology. IPL is TGA approved to treat severe meibomian-gland deficient (MGD) Dry Eye disease.

MGD is a common type of Dry Eye. It happens when the eyelid’s oil glands do not work well. This leads to poor-quality tears. These tears cannot protect the eyes from drying out.